Burning Glamour

R.J. Reynolds has redirected its energy. No longer does the cigarette company focus on baiting children with a seemingly innocent mascot, but they have now moved on to cornering the hipster market. Or maybe the children of the Joe Camel days are the hipsters of today, and productions like the one they put on last night at 3 Kings Tavern was just the tail end of a decade-long advertising campaign. Either way, Camel must be doing something right, because the amount of money being funneled into each of their events – Danny Masterson at the Bluebird in March, and The Faint at The Ogden in November of last year -- might even reach into the quintuple digits. I just hope there’s some left over when I sue R.J. Reynolds’ ass for chemotherapy money. Damn you, Joe! Damn you, and your beguiling ways.

The man, the brand, DJ Magic Cyclops, kicked off the evening, spinning hard rock and heavy metal – only when he wasn’t too busy making hackneyed quips about living with his mom and being broke. Jeff Campbell, co-owner of 3 Kings, argues that I “just don’t get the guy,” but one more desperate plea for tips in that contrived, British accent, and the man was going to get a Mickey’s 40 oz. to the head. People have been knocked out from less. The most entertainment Cyclops provided was when, at one point in the evening, he kept kicking open the door to the men’s bathroom SWAT-team style, and pantomimed shooting at unwitting customers. Now that was a pisser.

Sorry is the plight of the opening act, which in this case, was Boylesque. And even sorrier is the plight of skinny, hipster-boys who have to pelvic thrust their way through a forty-minute show when the turnout was a surprising 3:2, guys to girls. “What is this?” one perturbed patron asked me. Well, it appears to be two guys in matching, neon unitards, hoola-hooping to “Push It To The Limit.” Duh. When Michelle of Ooh-la-la Presents, passed around a tip bucket, it came back with 55 cents. At first, I thought it was 75 cents, but then realized I mistook a nickel for a quarter.

The Iron Maidens, who scorched through the entire “Best Of The Beast” catalogue, were everything one could ask of an all-girl tribute band: they were hot, they wailed, and they were, um, hot. A man much more schooled in rock ‘n’ roll than I (and with a penchant for ranking women he would like to sleep with), said between puffs of his Camel Filter: “that bassist – she is my number two. She plays just like Steve Harris. Not many bassists use their pinky, but she does.”

In the green room post-show, guitarist Sara Marsh, who was on crutches after just having had surgery on her Achilles tendon, was on the hunt for some doja, begging the question: don’t doctors in L.A., where the band is based, prescribe pot and Percocet like they’re candy? Someone call Anna Nicole’s physician. This was actually The Iron Maidens’s first gig in Colorado, and lead singer Aja Kim admitted – shortly after emitting a trucker burp into the microphone -- “We’re a little out of breath.” Well Aja, judging by the audience’s reaction to your midriff and guttural version of “Run To the Hills,” so were they. -- Sara Behunek